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In the budget file there are two main sections.

The first is M&S / Travel. These are for fixed costs that are not directly associated with a schedule task. They may be indirectly linked to a schedule item such as "Purchase x,y,z". In this section Travel and M&S are in two separate sub-groups. 

The second section is for Labor. Each of the rows in this section will have an equivalent row in the Schedule file. 

Outbound Reporting

Of all of the columns in this file the 5 that are used for project reporting are the following:

  • Actual Reported Cost Computed Or Real M&S
  • Budget Variance
  • Budget Variance With Contingency
  • Duration Variable From Schedule
  • Duration Variable With Contingency

These are the key outputs from this file and will appear in the project dashboard.

Description Of Columns

Category and Item

This column contains the name of the individual item for purchase or the individual scheduled task. It may also contain the name of a sub-group of items or tasks for organizational purposes.

Item Notes

This field is provided for allow the user to add budget planning specific notes related to a particular item. This can be self reminders of how an estimate was generated or can provide further details about what the task or sub group contains.

Budget Labor Hours or Qty

This field contains either the budgeted number of hours for a given task or the number of components being purchased. For the Labor section the value entered into this field should be linked outwardly to the equivalent task item in the schedule sheet. 

Cost per Item Fully Burdened

This field contains the fully burdened cost (with overhead) of the item being budgeted. For M&S items this is the cost after applying the M&S overhead factor for a given item. For the Labor section this cost is the fully burdened labor cost for the person being assigned the task. In some cases this cost will vary by job code or which project the task is for. 

Risk Factor

This is the assigned risk factor for each M&S and Labor item in the planned budget. You should assign the risk based upon your confidence level in the budgeted item. This field is used to compute a contingency factor for each budgeted line item.

Contingency Factor

This field contains the applied contingency multiplier based upon the risk factor assigned to the item.

Total Budget

This field is the computed cost of the M&S or Labor item based upon unit cost and quantity.

Budget With Contingency

This field is the result of applying the contingency factor to the Total Budget number.

Planned Duration From Schedule (Days)

This file is an incoming link from the Schedule sheet which contains the planned calendar duration of each task. This field is used in later fields to compute the schedule status of the project.

Planned Duration With Contingency (Days)

This field is the result of applying the contingency factor to the Planned Duration.

Assigned To From Schedule

This is an incoming linked field containing the resource name assigned to each Labor Task in the Schedule File.

Percent Complete From Schedule Or Local M&S

The use of this filed is slightly different between the M&S/Travel section and the Labor section. In the M&S/Travel section this is either 0% or 100% depending on if the item has been purchased, entered locally. In the Labor section this is the linked percentage complete field from the Budget sheet (not entered locally).

Earned Value

This field computes the earned value of a given item. For M&S this earned value is the estimated cost of an item if purchased, for Labor this is the Budgeted Labor Cost multiplied by the percentage complete. In a perfect project the Earned Value would match the total cost of the project.

Earned Value With Contingency

This field applies the contingency factor to the earned value field. 

Actual Hours From Schedule

This field is used in the Labor section only and is an incoming link of the actual hours charged to a given task. This field ideally should match the total budgeted hours for the task, but in reality it will be a value either greater to or less than the budgeted item.

Actual Report Cost Computed Or Real M&S

The use of this field changes between the M&S/Travel section and the Labor section. For M&S/Labor section the value in this field is manually entered with the real cost of the M&S or travel item. For the Labor section this is the result of multiplying the actual labor hours from the Schedule sheet by the hourly rate associated with this item.

Budget Variance

This line item is the result of comparing the Actual Cost of each line item with the Earned Value. A negative value in this field means that you earned more value than it costed for a given line item,  indicating a Budget under-run. A positive value is a budget overrun.

Budget Variance With Contingency

This is the same as Budget Variance but computed with contingency applied.

Duration Variance From Schedule

This is the linked duration variance value from the budget sheet. This is an indication of how many days you are behind or ahead of schedule. A positive value is an indication of being behind schedule, a negative value is an indication of being ahead of schedule.

Duration Variance With Contingency

This is the computed duration variance with the contingency factor applied.

 Project Code

This is the project portion of the PA-Code to which the costs associated with this line item should be charged. This is outwardly linked to the Schedule tasks.

 Activity Code

This is the activity portion of the PA-Code to which the costs associated with this line item should be charged. This is outwardly linked to the Schedule tasks.




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